Dealing from the top down. (WIP).

The market For convertible roof systems is changing rapidly, driven by buyers' desires for all-weather drop-top vehicles. "In the near future," says Dr. Wolfgang Thurow, executive vice president of Webasto AG, "the worldwide market For convertible tops will grow from the approximately 600,000 units of today to 1.4 million units. Of this, we think one million will be retractable hard tops, with the remaining 400,000 units the more traditional soft top convertible."

To meet this growing demand, Webasto has joined forces with design house Pininfarina to create a new 50/50 joint venture called Open Air Systems. "Pininfarina was a logical choice because it is well versed in the design and engineering of niche vehicles," says Or. Thurow. Best known as Ferrari's design house, Pininfarina has three assembly plants located near its Turin, Italy, base that currently produce the Mitsubishi Pajero Pinin, Alfa Romeo Spider and GTV, Peugeot 306 convertible and 40E Coupe. The Street Ka-a two-seat convertible version of Ford's Ka mini car-will be added to the lineup later this year. Pininfarina has a total production of about 50,000 units per year, a number it doesn't necessarily want to increase. "It's not our intention to produce the vehicles designed and developed by the joint venture company," says Pininfarina, "because we don't want to add brick and mortar. Our job is to give the automakers design, engineering, and logistical support to develop a vehicle that uses locally sourced roof systems and is produced in their own plants." You can see his point when you consider that Pininfarina's return on engineering and design are three to six times greater, respectively, than its return on producing vehicles For others.

Near-term, Open Air Systems wants to capture 15% of the global convertible market, a number that it says will rise as it adds the engineering capabilities necessary to produce complete convertible systems in North America. "Already we are getting calls from (North American) OEMs about our capabilities," says Franz-Josef Kortum, president and CEO of Webasto. "The inquiries include everything from adding retractable hard tops to current vehicles, to treating unique Pininfarina designs on future platforms." Headquarters for the company will be located just outside of Munich, Germany.